Can “breakthrough” COVID-19 cause protracted symptoms?

Dr. Jennifer Posic, medical director of the post-COVID recovery program at Yale New Haven Hospital, said she was unaware of vaccinated people seeking long-term COVID treatment at her clinic, but she soon said. I’m hoping to start watching.

“We definitely anticipate them, because the groundbreaking cases are otherwise behaving much like the main cases we’ve seen.”

In Philadelphia, Dr. Benjamin Abramov, director of the Post-COVID Assessment and Recovery Clinic at the University of Pennsylvania, said patients with sudden infections came to his clinic but fewer than unvaccinated. Stated.

When vaccinated people become infected with the coronavirus, their illness tends to be mild, and mild illness is unlikely to lead to long COVIDs, he said.

“People who only have a runny nose and sore throat are less likely to have a long COVID than those who have been bedridden for a month and have severe headaches,” Abramoff said.

By preventing these more severe cases without preventing the infection, he said, the vaccine reduces the risk of long-term COVID.

“of course [vaccination] Protects you from long COVIDs, “said Abramov.

recently study In the UK, data on 1.2 million adults confirms this concept. Four weeks after being infected with COVID-19, vaccinated people were found to be 50% less likely to develop symptoms than unvaccinated people.

“This result suggests that individuals who receive double vaccination have a reduced risk of long-term COVID. [the two recommended doses], If you want to further consider reducing the overall risk of infection that has already been documented, “the authors say. write Lancet infection, released on September 1st.

Long COVID (sometimes called the acute sequelae of COVID-19 or PASC) is largely understood, as people suffering from COVID-19 remain ill for weeks or months after the virus clears the system. No state or group of states. This affected an estimated 10% to 30% of COVID-19 survivors, most of whom were not ill enough to require hospitalization.

In some cases, the patient was unable to recover from the initial illness. People may also feel recovered and experience a new set of symptoms two weeks or a month later.

Some of the most common are fatigue, brain fog, insomnia, headaches, dyspnea, and palpitations. Some people feel numbness or dizziness in their limbs.But fatigue and cognitive impairment The most annoying symptom, Often makes people unable to work.

Lauren Bazensky ran daily across eight miles easily. However, after getting COVID-19 in April, a 41-year-old consultant needs to walk a short distance, breathe out, and analyze the limited energy reserves daily.

“I don’t have the energy to bring joy,” she said.

She also suffers from insomnia and muscle stiffness, and most worrisome is the feeling that her thoughts are vague and impaired. She has a hard time searching for words.

“You can’t access your brain like you used to,” she said. “That’s the scary part.”

Bazensky, who lives in Chicago, said he was infected two weeks after receiving the Pfizer vaccine twice. She describes herself as a person with a “very very weak immune system” who catches circulating bugs.

When she explained her long-term symptoms to her doctor, they didn’t have much to offer. Most recently, Bazensky learned about a long COVID clinic near his home in Chicago, the Northwestern Medical Comprehensive COVID-19 Center she plans to visit.

The northwestern clinic is in it dozens It is occurring nationwide in response to the increasing number of long-term COVID cases.

In collaboration with the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 35 of these clinics (including the Beth Israel clinic) have been established. Collaborative Create treatment guidelines. First guideline, Fatigue management, Recently published.

However, there are no silver bullets left, and treatment usually involves managing each symptom one by one, such as by breathing, meditation, or physiotherapy.

In Beth Israel, which currently treats about 400 long COVID patients, most patients have gradually improved and some have improved so much that they no longer need to return, Marie said.

Posic, a doctor at Yale University, says there is one surefire way to avoid long COVIDs. In the first place, avoid COVID-19 infection. And she said vaccines continue to be the best way to do that, along with masking and distance, especially in areas of high prevalence.

You can access Felice J. Freyer at the following URL: [email protected].. Follow her on Twitter @felicejfreyer..